Transcript Lecture # 21 (Ling 2 - Eng 504).pptx

Lecture # 21
STYLISTICS II
REVIEW OF LECTURE 20
A branch of applied linguistics concerned with
the study of style in texts, especially (but not
exclusively) in literary works.
 linguistic stylistics - the description of literary
texts by methods derived from general
linguistic theory, using the categories of the
description of language as a whole.

REVIEW OF LECTURE 20

A comparison of each text by the same or by
different authors in the same and in different
genres.

Technically speaking, stylistics is the study of
the linguistic features of a literary text phonological, lexical, syntactical
REVIEW OF LECTURE 20
Merits & Demerits of some definitions
 Style as an embellishment – just
ornamentation
 Style as choice between alternate expression

STYLISTICS II (MERITS & DEMERITS – CONTD..)
3 & 4. Style as a set of individual or collected
characteristics
 The emphasis on individual element of style
quite important – it must be allowed for in all
linguistic studies.
 Almost all writers have their individual
individuality – readers can identify their writing
STYLISTICS II
Sometimes it can be done objectively by
statistical counts of frequencies of linguistical
features in limited contexts.
 Still it becomes difficult to identify style with
individual expression.
 First, some features taken as stylistic as not
individual – they are found in others as well
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STYLISTICS II
Third, how can we separate the ‘unique and
inimitable’ features of a given style from all the
other features necessarily present in the text
we are studying.
 Individual modes of expression form a category
too special to give us a general basis for an
ideally powerful style definition
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STYLISTICS II
The identification of style with the individual
elements of language pre-supposes the setting
up of norms of comparison.
 Definition of style as a set of individual
features/characteristics is unsatisfactory.
 It fails to pin-point the expressive
characteristics which are clearly indicative of
style

STYLISTICS II
5. Style as deviation from a norm
 Such definition could be useful if they could
define both the norm and the deviations in
concrete and operational terms.

Such definitions fail to establish a precise
relationship between text and norm
STYLISTICS II
The question how norm- defining features are
different from general features of style still
unanswered
 Norm-defining features may be stated in terms
of metre (‘heroic couplets’), time (Elizabethan
style), place (‘Yank humour’), language, dialect,
writer (‘Shakespearean style’), literary work
(‘Byronic style’),

STYLISTICS II
School of writers (‘metaphysical’, ‘romantic’),
genre (‘poetic style, journalese’), social
situation (a brigadier addressing to a brigade,
or a principal speaking to his students), and so
forth.
 All such norms seem to be roughly
circumscribed by context, including time, place
and situation.

STYLISTICS II
It becomes evident that it is difficult to
separate style from context.
 No way to know what an accepted norm is
5. Style as set of those relations among linguistic
entities that are stable in terms of wider spans
of text than the sentence
Prof. Hill’s definition is important here.

STYLISTICS II

Prof. Hill has defined stylistics as concerning all
those relations among linguistic entities which
are stable or maybe stable in terms of wider
spans than those within the limits of the
sentence.

This definition too is inadequate.
STYLISTICS II
It neither conflicts with the view of style as
choice or as tabulation of alternatives, nor rules
out the study of frequencies and probabilities
on style determination.
 Even a single sentence possesses style and
one cannot write a single sentence without
style.
 Concept of spans not so much stylistic as
grammatical
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STYLISTICS II
Linguistic Approach To Style
 Style in literature is a recognizable but elusive
phenomenon
 Part of difficulty in discussing style is because
of temptation to attempt simutaneous answers
to linguistic, pragmatic, and aesthetic
questions concerned with different levels of,
and attitudes to, the communication process.
STYLISTICS II
Present day linguists in narrow rigorous sense
focus on the linguistic features present in the
given text and on analysis of their distribution
and frequencies.
 But a poem, a novel, or an essay is more than a
style – its style is just a part
 Any satisfactory stylistic analysis would be a
combination of all the six approaches:
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STYLISTICS II
Six approaches: 1)Style as an embellishment,
2)Style as choice between alternate expression,
3)Style as a set of individual characteristics, 4)style
as deviations from a norm, 5)style as a set of
collective characteristics, 6)Style as set of those
relations among linguistic entities that are stable in
terms of wider spans of text than the sentence
STYLISTICS II
A definition of style should have observational,
explanatory and predictive adequacy.
 It should account for all choices –
paradigmatic, grammatical, stylistics, should
make inventory of style markers, stylistical
natural markers, stylistic features,
characteristics, should state the contextual
spread of the style markers,
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STYLISTICS II
Should account for over-lapping of stylistic sets
(already established by study of other texts),
shift of style or contextual transfer, should keep
in mind distinction between style and dialect,
should be able to study a text microstylistically
and macrostylistically.
 Style is the aggregate of frequencies because it
is the result of more than one linguistic item.
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STYLISTICS II
For example, a given word in a text acquires
stylistic significance by jextaposition with other
words.
 Secondly, the study of style must not be
restricted to phonological or morphological or
lexical or syntactical observations: it must be
built up of observations at various levels.

STYLISTICS II
Style is concerned with frequencies of linguistic
items in a given context.
 To measure the style of the passage,
frequencies of its linguistic items of different
levels must be compared with the
corresponding features in other text or corpus
regarded as norm and having definite
contextual relationship with this passage
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STYLISTICS II

Example: For stylistic analysis of one of Pope’s
poem, norms with varying contextual
relationships include English eighteenth
century poetry, the corpus of Pope’s work, all
poems written in English in rhymed pentameter
couplets, or, for greater contrast as well as
comparison, the poetry of Wordsworth.
Style is a link between context and linguistic
form and the style of a text may be examined in
relation to:
1. impressionistically recognized norms of
language use
2. Text by other authors recognized by reference
to one as comparable
3. Other text by the same author recognized by
reference to 1 & 2 as comparable.
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STYLISTICS II
This intra and extra textual study of the
contextualization in the light of linguistic
structure and its history that has come to be
styled ‘stylistics’.
 The student of style must see language and
literature in relation to other functions of
language (socio-linguistics), in relation to other
norms (statistic stylistics)
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STYLISTICS II
in relation to the individual and collective
characteristics inherent in the work, in the
writer, in the age/period and in the literary
tradition of the age. The stylistic selection
should not mean ‘the choice between items
that mean more or less the same’.
 Some classification of context is a pre-requisite
for a sound stylistic analysis.
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STYLISTICS II
All stylistic analysis is ultimately based on the
matching of a text against a contextually
related norm.
 Enkvist says, contextually bound linguistic
items function as style markers. Style markers
occurring in the same text form a stylistic set
for that text.
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STYLISTICS II
A stylistic set shared by a large number of
contextually related text forms a major stylistic
set occurring within a major contextual range.
 Texts sharing the same major stylistic set in the
same major style

SUMMARY


Style as a set of individual or collected
characteristics
Almost all writers have their individual
individuality
Style as deviation from a norm
It becomes evident that it is difficult to
separate style from context.
No way to know what an accepted norm is
SUMMARY
Style as set of those relations among linguistic
entities that are stable in terms of wider spans
of text than the sentence.
 Even a single sentence possesses style and
one cannot write a single sentence without
style.
 Concept of spans not so much stylistic as
grammatical
SUMMARY
Style is the aggregate of frequencies because it
is the result of more than one linguistic item.
 Any satisfactory stylistic analysis would be a
combination of all the six approaches:
 All stylistic analysis is ultimately based on the
matching of a text against a contextually
related norm.
